Smart assistants like Siri, Google Home, and Amazon Echo could soon be implemented with a “moral AI” to decide whether to report their owners for breaking the law.

Scientists at the University of Bergen, Norway proposed the incredibly Orwellian idea of inserting morals into A.I. code at the ACM conference in Hawaii on Artificial Intelligence, Ethics and Society, Dailymailreported.

Yes, you read that right, scientists want to make that little hunk of metal of invasive technology even more invasive.

The researchers are pushing for what’s being deemed, enhanced ethical smart software that could be potentially one of the most dangerous implementations into these home assistants leading them to become sentient and deciding human beings’ fates; and not just any human beings, their own owners. As a result, millions of people would be under constant surveillance not even requiring a snitch program like Amazon’s Ring doorbell spyware as Activist Post previously reported.

No, instead, little tin cans would be doing the watching that are sold as alleged “home assistants.”

The research was led by Marija Slavkovik, an associate professor in the department of information science and media studies. As well as by two other professors at the University of Luxembourg and Zhejiang University, Leon van der Torre and Beishui Liao.

According to the publication, Slavkovik recommended that these digital accessories be implanted with “ethical awareness that simultaneously represents both the owner and the authorities – or, in the case of a minor, their parents. ”

“This would let them to weigh-up whether to report illegal activity to the police, effectively putting millions of people under constant surveillance,” the Daily Mail explained, adding that Dr. Marija Slavkovik, who led the research, “suggested that digital assistants should possess an ethical awareness that simultaneously represents both the owner and the authorities — or, in the case of a minor, their parents.”

If that’s not enough, remember that sentient thing I wrote above? Well, Dailymail reports the “home assistant” devices “would then have an internal ‘discussion’ about suspect behaviour, weighing up conflicting demands between the law and personal freedoms, before arriving at the ‘best’ course of action.”

Yes, robots would now have the power to decide whether or not to notify authorities about a crime committed by their owner.

There is [already] an ethical conflict between people in one family, let alone between people and manufacturer, or shareholders of the manufacturer and programers.

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If we want to avoid Orwellian outcomes it’s important that all stakeholders are identified and have a say, including when machines shouldn’t be able to listen in. Right now only the manufacturer decides. (Source: Dailymail)

Ironically, or perhaps not (since a robot Sophia was already given citizenship in Saudi Arabia), on the other side of the hemisphere in Japan a robot has been created to preach the teachings of Buddha in colloquial language at the Kodaiji Temple in the ancient city of Kyoto, Express.co.ukreported.

This robotic A.I. named Mindar is created in the image of Kannon Bodhisattva, the Buddhist Goddess of Mercy. In other words, the publication reports that this robot is being viewed as a “god.” So first we have citizenship given to a robot, now we have a robot playing god, oh joy!

Questions remain on giving A.I. the power to decide human decisions or even rights that humans have, as Beth Singler from the University of Cambridge told New Scientist.

“Humans and human situations are far messier than this method makes out,” Singler said. “Some might want it dealt with within the family, while others may take a hard line and seek police involvement. This disparity is likely to be found in all the groups of people.”

Although this practice may already have taken place; in 2017 two shocking news stories hit the Internet. One had to do with Amazon’s Echo calling the police and the other with Google Home calling the police. However, Amazon denied that its Echo devices could call the police and Google did the same for its home assistant.

An article last year from the New York Postexplains why the devices can’t call 911, and it has to do with numerous shortcomings on the device as well as regulatory concerns. Further, another article written by CNET explains that Amazon and Google smart home assistants aren’t connected to a landline. However, police claimed in the incident involving the Echo that the device was connected to a landline.

So for now, it may prove to be a challenge to enable and push such an Orwellian future where home devices report their owners for crimes to the police, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t worry about it. We should also pay attention to the attempts like Ford filing patents for automatic artificial intelligence-driven police cars that would punish humans. A concept that might sound crazy, but Dubai has already had that societal system in place since 2017, as Nicholas West reported last year.

This is the beginning of The Terminatormovie, as even scientists agree that machines will begin to think for themselves in the near future and could be a threat to the human race. As an example, Facebook’s algorithm developed its own language to talk to other robots, Forbes reported. So what happens when, not if, robots all communicate with each other and they then proceed to plan a takeover of the human race like the movie I, Robot?

So why are these scientists looking to enable that?

One such famous scientist, Stephen Hawking, has previously warned that “artificial intelligence could spell the end for the human race If we are not careful enough because they are too clever.”

All this also highlights what Elon Musk has previously warned, that a universal basic income (UBI) — essentially free cash handouts — “will be necessary over time if (AI) artificial intelligence takes over most human jobs.”

But we should all rest easy because when Pepper a UK robot was asked on the floor of UK Parliament “where humanity stands in a world run by A.I.?” at a committee hearing on artificial intelligence (AI) and “the fourth industrial revolution” it responded: “Robots will have an important role to play, but we will always need the soft skills that are unique to humans: to sense, make, and drive value from technology.”

That is of course until robots take over our jobs and figure out human greed, envy and other such emotions — Pepper and Activist Post have both been sounding the alarm of the coming robot apocalypse.